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<blockquote data-quote="humble minion" data-source="post: 5163633" data-attributes="member: 5948">The glib answer is 'evil is in the eye of the beholder'.&nbsp; From an in-character point of view, according to the PCs, Evil is whatever it is that they're currently fighting against.&nbsp; Why would they take such hideous risks to oppose it otherwise?&nbsp; As for the other questions - well, I entirely agree in principle, but practically it's a bit more difficult.&nbsp; When you're writing a general AP for a general audience, then do you really want to limit things by deciding the PCs can only be on one side of a morally roughly equivalent conflict?&nbsp; Regarding PCs being on either side - does every module have to account for the possibility that the PCs may change sides at any time?&nbsp; Or even worse, that SOME of the PCs might change sides at any time?&nbsp; You'd end up writing two APs, or even more, trying to cover all the possible bases.&nbsp; I think James Jacobs said that for the sake of the writers' sanity an Adventure Path has to be an Adventure PATH, rather than Adventure Lots Of Little Branching Paths or an Adventure Multiple Possible Paths.&nbsp; How would you have gone writing WotBS if you'd had to assume that the PCs might join up with the Inquisition at any time?Having a moral dichotomy of sorts (maybe a moral distinction is a better word) is a relatively clean way of nudging the PCs along a set of consecutive modules via their own choices.&nbsp; Sure, it's not how real life works, and it's not even how a good home campaign works, but a published AP doesn't have the luxury of being able to react to the PCs actions as much as a live GM does, when it comes to the overall campaign direction.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="humble minion, post: 5163633, member: 5948"] The glib answer is 'evil is in the eye of the beholder'. From an in-character point of view, according to the PCs, Evil is whatever it is that they're currently fighting against. Why would they take such hideous risks to oppose it otherwise? As for the other questions - well, I entirely agree in principle, but practically it's a bit more difficult. When you're writing a general AP for a general audience, then do you really want to limit things by deciding the PCs can only be on one side of a morally roughly equivalent conflict? Regarding PCs being on either side - does every module have to account for the possibility that the PCs may change sides at any time? Or even worse, that SOME of the PCs might change sides at any time? You'd end up writing two APs, or even more, trying to cover all the possible bases. I think James Jacobs said that for the sake of the writers' sanity an Adventure Path has to be an Adventure PATH, rather than Adventure Lots Of Little Branching Paths or an Adventure Multiple Possible Paths. How would you have gone writing WotBS if you'd had to assume that the PCs might join up with the Inquisition at any time? Having a moral dichotomy of sorts (maybe a moral distinction is a better word) is a relatively clean way of nudging the PCs along a set of consecutive modules via their own choices. Sure, it's not how real life works, and it's not even how a good home campaign works, but a published AP doesn't have the luxury of being able to react to the PCs actions as much as a live GM does, when it comes to the overall campaign direction. [/QUOTE]

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